Tennessee’s Haley Bearden (11) celebrates making it safely to second base during a NCAA Super Regional game between Tennessee and Texas A&M at Sherri Parker Lee Stadium on Saturday, May 27, 2017. Texas A&M defeated Tennessee 6-5.

The backup first baseman sent a two-run homer soaring over the right-field bleachers in the eighth inning, giving the Lady Vols a 6-4 victory over LSU at Lee Stadium.

The homer ended a long, joyful day that began with a 3-2 victory for No. 10 Tennessee (37-8, 8-7 SEC). It also capped a weekend series sweep for a team that had lost seven of its last nine conference games.

The statistics suggested Bearden from was an unlikely hero. She had an .077 batting average with 11 strikeouts in 39 at-bats this season. But UT co-head coach Karen Weekly thought otherwise of the junior from Clarksville.

“Haley does that every day in practice,” Weekly said. “I’m not kidding you. She does that every day in practice. We watch her hit those balls and we say to her, ‘Will you please swing the bat in a game?’

“Because when you look at her numbers, she’s the fourth-leading person in strikeouts with not that many at-bats and most of them are looking … I’m just so happy she swung.”

Bearden, who entered the game in the seventh inning, was matter-of-fact about her feat.

“I was trying to be calm and not make (the situation) any bigger that what it is,” she said.

Tennessee overcame three different deficits for the second-game victory, benefiting from two errors in the seventh to score the tying run and force the extra inning.

The sweep was largely a matter of Tennessee outnumbering No. 14 LSU (32-10, 7-7) on the mound. Matty Moss and Caylan Arnold split the victories. Gabby Sprang made an appearance in the second game. LSU All-American Carley Hoover, meanwhile, threw every pitch in both games for the Tigers.

With the threat of inclement weather looming for Sunday, the day was rescheduled as a doubleheader. Weekly thought the change might work against UT pitching-wise.

“I’ve really got to hand it to our pitchers,” she said. “They were put in a lot of tough situations this weekend, runners on base. They pitched their way out of a lot of jams.”

Moss and Arnold performed like a tag team to close out the opening victory.

Moss started the seventh and allowed two hitters to reach via a single and a fielder’s choice grounder by speedy Tigers left fielder Aliyah Andrews. Arnold relieved and retired Taryn Antoine on a deep fly to right field. But the sophomore right-hander, who earned the pitching victory Friday night, surrendered an RBI single and went 2-0 on the pitch count to dangerous slugger Amanda Doyle.

Back came Moss, who tied Tennessee’s single-season record for saves Friday with her fifth. The junior right-hander needed two pitches to retire Doyle on a foul pop-up to third baseman Chelsea Seggern, stranding two baserunners.

Thus ended a pitching duel that was one-sided in favor of LSU’s Hoover regarding strikeouts. The Tigers’ senior right-hander struck out 13 Lady Vols, including seven of eight hitters during one dominant stretch in the middle innings.

But Hoover’s wildness betrayed her power.

Tennessee reunited Jenna Holcomb with Aubrey Leach at the top of the batting order and both Lady Vols drew walks to start the first inning. Hoover later hit a batter. Her wild pitch allowed Leach to score.

Another walk and a passed ball factored into Tennessee’s second run, which came in the third.

The decisive run was scored in the sixth on Scarlet McSwain’s RBI double, UT’s lone hit with runners in scoring position.

For the three-game series, McSwain, who was 2-for-11 at the plate in the previous five games, had five hits and three RBIs.